HIGH SCHOOL HOLIDAYS.

Evening Star, Issue 18332, 20 July 1923, Page 5

HIGH SCHOOL HOLIDAYS.

TO THK EDITOa. _ Sir, —In your issue of this evening I read with indignant surprise a suggestion by Miss King, of tho Girls’ High School," that tho September term holidays might he curtailed to make up for the loss of time occasioned by the present epidemic of colds and influenza. Such a suggestion betokens a blindness to facts and a callousness (unintentional, no doubt) one would not expect from such a lady—a lady who is held in high esteem by those who know her, hut who, in conjunction with so many oilier teachers, worships at the altar of tho great 'god “ Cram.” With a school teacher the health of her pupils should bo tho first consideration, ns it is obvious the healthy scholar is the more efficient one. Scholars of high school age, more particularly girls, require careful treatment. It is quite possible to develop the brain at the expense of the body. The usual term holidays, even under normal conditions, are none tool gon, and, as results show, do not interfere with the proper scholastic advancement of the pupils. Those scholars who have not been laid up during tho last few weeks have been exposed to tho dreary, depressing influence of tho miserable weather and the epidemic, and many of them, owing to illness in the home, have been subjected to inconvenience and worse; while those who have been ill return to school often too soon, with their vigor depleted. For all of these the usual holidays in the spring weather of September will he a beneficial and mnehncoded tonic. To deprive them of any part would be a scandal and a crime. While on the subject of children returning to school before, they arc properly better, this applies in many cases to the more brilliant among them. The fear that they will lose marks during their absence retards their progress to health, and causes them to return 100 soon. It is to bo hoped that at both high schools and primary no marks at all for prize purposes will he awarded during the month or more affected by the epidemic. In common fairness this should be done. No one can suffer by it. Those who have boon away will still bo at- a disadvantage which cannot he prevented, and will right itself in duo course.

Tire chairman and members of the High Schools’ Board of Governors should havo closed the schools. It is ludicrous to read of tho Boys’ High School “ carrying on ” with substitute masters (poor pupils!) and about a hundred scholars away. The fact that tho Health Department, as we read to-night, lias seen fit to give instructions to send certain boys homo and special directions as to ventilating tbo classrooms is a glaring indictment, of the policy of “ carrying on.” No real progress with the school work can lie made under such conditions; while infinite harm may bo done. Many primary schools havo needed no hint from tho Health Department. Their committees have adopted the safe and sane altitude of dosing down for at least a week to give scholars and staff an opportunity to become reasonably fit to resume, Contrast this with the chairman of Ihe High Schools’ Board. A paltry two days’ holiday, and on returning in tho wet to school this morning at more or less risk to health, conditions are so bad that the girls are sent home again, and numbers of thorn from tho country very likely compelled to wait hours for trains. Children are only young once, and those in authority over them should not bo too old to remember it, and to remember that not only their intellects hut their bodies arc in the making, and nothing should bo allowed to mar either of them.— l am, etc., Paeent. July 10.